BillHicks
07/13/2016, 02:54 AM
Hello to all,
Long time (years) lurker, first time signing up. Not my first tank, but thought it would be interesting to post my setup and theory, and see what you experienced members have to say. I also thought it'd be nice to have somewhere to catalog the changes over the next few months.
25 years of Freshwater experience, but I've only been in saltwater for about 6 years. I started with a Nanocube 24, then upgraded to a 75, and now that I've moved I'm downgrading to a nano-38 gallon.
I tried to attached a pic of the setup, so we'll see how that works since I'm a new member...
The equipment:
1)Innovative Marine Dual-Strip LED Replaced with AI Prime (Non-HD) LED Fixture
B)Hydor Koralia Slim-Skim Nano Protein Skimmer (right-rear chamber)
3)Ecotech MP-10 Wireless Powerhead
D)200 Watt Heater
5)Custom media tray (left-rear chamber)
F)10-watt Underwater light (arrives this week) for refugium in bubble-trap chamber next to skimmer.
Starting theory for this setup:
Because I'm not as experienced with saltwater tanks, before I started initially I gathered knowledge from all over, and I think that's where I went wrong. Instead of typical startup advice, this time I'm going to grow my bio-load as the tank grows with livestock. Rather than 60 pounds of live rock, I started with 4 pounds. Instead of live sand, I started with dry sand. Instead of going crazy with 30 of each clean-up crew member, I'm starting with no more than 1 per 10 gallons.
Results so far:
Tank cycle was started with urine, sounds gross to some, but I wanted to start this tank as cheap as possible just to experiment. With my 4lbs of live rock and 19 pounds of dry rock, my spike started in 24 hours, and params went back to 0 within 48 hours. Tank cycle was initially started on June 19th.
Funny Story about this tank:
Because I moved to an apartment, I was initially going to sell this setup because I didn't want to lug water from the fish store constantly. But then I saw a spot in my kitchen where I could easily setup my own RO/DI and mix my own water, so I thought I'd give it a shot. After about 12 hours of my filter being setup, I got a knock on my door from my downstairs neighbor, she was telling me something in my kitchen was dripping through the light fixture in her kitchen downstairs. It immediately clicked that I probably had a leak on my RO system, and I invited her in while I investigated the leak. She saw my tank, and then told me she has a RedSea 120 (I think) downstairs. She has been a great help so far, and donated a lot of my initial livestock for my tank, which included:
Red and Green Macro Algae (with pods)
Wall Hammer Coral
Acan (not sure what kind)
2 Blue-leg hermits
1 Astria Snail
Ghost Shrimp
Another coral I can't remember the name of right now
So having a filter leak has introduced me to a great neighbor, and we've found out we have a lot in common. Very grateful that my plumbing error allowed us to meet.
I will post more updates for this tank later, I'm still trying to gather all the pics so I can post them in order as the tank as grown so far.
Long time (years) lurker, first time signing up. Not my first tank, but thought it would be interesting to post my setup and theory, and see what you experienced members have to say. I also thought it'd be nice to have somewhere to catalog the changes over the next few months.
25 years of Freshwater experience, but I've only been in saltwater for about 6 years. I started with a Nanocube 24, then upgraded to a 75, and now that I've moved I'm downgrading to a nano-38 gallon.
I tried to attached a pic of the setup, so we'll see how that works since I'm a new member...
The equipment:
1)Innovative Marine Dual-Strip LED Replaced with AI Prime (Non-HD) LED Fixture
B)Hydor Koralia Slim-Skim Nano Protein Skimmer (right-rear chamber)
3)Ecotech MP-10 Wireless Powerhead
D)200 Watt Heater
5)Custom media tray (left-rear chamber)
F)10-watt Underwater light (arrives this week) for refugium in bubble-trap chamber next to skimmer.
Starting theory for this setup:
Because I'm not as experienced with saltwater tanks, before I started initially I gathered knowledge from all over, and I think that's where I went wrong. Instead of typical startup advice, this time I'm going to grow my bio-load as the tank grows with livestock. Rather than 60 pounds of live rock, I started with 4 pounds. Instead of live sand, I started with dry sand. Instead of going crazy with 30 of each clean-up crew member, I'm starting with no more than 1 per 10 gallons.
Results so far:
Tank cycle was started with urine, sounds gross to some, but I wanted to start this tank as cheap as possible just to experiment. With my 4lbs of live rock and 19 pounds of dry rock, my spike started in 24 hours, and params went back to 0 within 48 hours. Tank cycle was initially started on June 19th.
Funny Story about this tank:
Because I moved to an apartment, I was initially going to sell this setup because I didn't want to lug water from the fish store constantly. But then I saw a spot in my kitchen where I could easily setup my own RO/DI and mix my own water, so I thought I'd give it a shot. After about 12 hours of my filter being setup, I got a knock on my door from my downstairs neighbor, she was telling me something in my kitchen was dripping through the light fixture in her kitchen downstairs. It immediately clicked that I probably had a leak on my RO system, and I invited her in while I investigated the leak. She saw my tank, and then told me she has a RedSea 120 (I think) downstairs. She has been a great help so far, and donated a lot of my initial livestock for my tank, which included:
Red and Green Macro Algae (with pods)
Wall Hammer Coral
Acan (not sure what kind)
2 Blue-leg hermits
1 Astria Snail
Ghost Shrimp
Another coral I can't remember the name of right now
So having a filter leak has introduced me to a great neighbor, and we've found out we have a lot in common. Very grateful that my plumbing error allowed us to meet.
I will post more updates for this tank later, I'm still trying to gather all the pics so I can post them in order as the tank as grown so far.